6 Stinkers in a Row
Going through the book by Ken Forkish. Good success so for. I am doing pretty well with Pain de Campagne and Pain au Bacon. Dropped 6 stinkers in a row with Overnight Country Blond. Dough is just a blob on the table. No structure at all. Levain culture is highly active. I am now folding much more vigorously and doing so 6 times. Bulk fermentation seems to go well. In 13-14 hrs I have increased in size by 2.5-3 fold at 68 degrees. Seems to have minimal structure when shaping. Doing 4 shaping folds as per Forkish. Finger dent test at 4 hours proofing shows spring back slowly about half way. When I dump out of my basket the dough flattens out with no evidence of structure. Baking shows no oven spring at all. Taste’s good but crum is tight and closed. Any suggestions would be most appreciated. CaptTPT
You are another victim of the time frames included in Forkish's otherwise superb book.
If you do a search on this site, you will find that many persons (myself included) have suffered from watching the clock and not the dough. In fact, one of his overnight recipes was my first complete failure.
The bulk fermentation cannot go 13-14 hours without the gluten breaking down (unless you are in a refrigerator). Also, if the finger poke has the dough springing back only halfway, that is a sign of massive over-proofing. The dough should rise back slowly but nearly completely to the original position before the poke.
Reduce the time frames and you will be on the road to a successful bake.
Keep posting questions, and let us know how it goes.
Happy baking.
Ted
Thank you, good to know, I just bought this book because it was on sale and a friend recommended. I agree, those are crazy fermentation times.
Thanks. I have only used the time as a rough guide. He says the dough should triple in size in that time frame. I used 2.5 times as my cutoff point. I’ll try cutting that back to 2x and see how that goes. I tried cutting off a small part of the dough and putting it in a small cup to accurately measure volume increase. Didn’t work well. I’ll give it a go again and see what happens.
Knead by hand up front for a few minutes, cancel s/f, only rise to almost doubled. Enjoy!
Ok. This time I placed a slice off the dough after all folds complete into a shot glass. I moved to shaping when the volume was just doubled., which was at 11 hrs at 68 degrees. Proofing was 2 hrs. Finger dent showed about 80% spring back at that time. Happy with the outcome. Any other suggestions?
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Excellent progress. Be sure to post a photo of the crumb. That will tell a lot too.
Happy baking.
Ted
Light and airy. Beautiful flavor.
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Beautiful loaf, well done for sticking with it and not giving up.
Benny